NY Times Ignores Muslim Day Parade Call for 'Blasphemy' Law, State Senator's Walkout

Note:  This post has been revised to reflect the Times's 2012 coverage. The original version erroneously linked to a 2010 article. I sincerely regret the error.

The New York Times's coverage of year's annual Muslim Day parade in Manhattan appears to have consisted of a photo at This Week in Pictures and another at the City Room blog.

At the end of the parade, in news not relayed by the Times, at least one speaker called for suppression and criminalization of free speech and another seemed to revel in violence-based rhetoric. One can hardly argue that these presentations weren't related to the parade, since invited political dignitaries were on hand, including one gentleman, Democrat New York State Senator Tony Avello, who walked out after hearing calls for punishment speech seen to commit "blasphemy" against Muslim prophet Muhammed.

A video (HT Free Republic) from UnitedWest.org, whose mission is to create "a united effort to fight the encroachment of shariah Islam in North America and Europe," shows speakers saying the following in broken English:

(Identified as "a Brooklyn imam") The freedom of speech and freedom of rights our problem starts. So I would like to demand United Nations to make an international law that would criminalize blasphemy. I again demand to the United Nations and to this platform, please make an international law, for the protection of honor of our beloved prophet.

(Identified as "a very articulate English woman") We have the unborn martyrs in our wombs and drop bombs in here because all that we blow up is mines in minefields. They (referring to Palestinians, according to the video -- Ed.) resonate in refugee camps and housed by Zionist Nazis ...

The video shows Mr. Avella, who was one of the parade's marshals and was apparently slated to eventually speak, hastily walking off the stage during the second presenter's speech. Though he clearly wasn't in the mood to discuss his decision, he did tell the United West representative who approached him after he left the stage that "I was offended."

Photo coverage at the Times, by contrast, was of a child of Khyume Khan, a New York Police Department officer, standing in a group with an American flag positioned nearby, and a woman holding a sign insisting that "Thugs and killers don't represent Benghazi nor Islam." It's legitimate to ask whether the Brooklyn imam "represents Islam, but apparently the Times wasn't interest in finding out the answer.

Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.